Paris League

Paris League

 

(1584–94), an alliance of broad strata of the population of Paris during the religious wars in France; from 1585 to 1594, part of the Catholic League.

The Paris League fought against both Henry III and Henry of Navarre, the leader of the Huguenots. The heterogeneous social composition of the League, which included the bourgeoisie, artisans, and members of the lower classes, led to a schism in its leadership body, the Council. After the popular uprising in Paris on May 12, 1588 (the Day of the Barricades), a committee known as the Council of the Sixteen (a reference to the number of districts in the city) broke away from the Council. The Sixteen, which relied on the support of democratic elements, overthrew Henry III and established a provisional government. Fearing social reforms, on which the masses of the townspeople were insisting, bourgeois elements in the Paris League obtained the dissolution of the Sixteen, in December 1591. Later, they recognized Henry of Navarre, who had become a Catholic, as king of France (Henry IV). After his entry into Paris, the League was dissolved (1594).